Thursday, 13 November 2014

Some thoughts from Elin

This is Elin, one of our trainees on board the Fram. We usually ask our trainees to write an edition of the blog and your faithful bloggers are thrilled when they accept (do they have a choice?!!!).

..............................

We have now been onboard Fram
for 13 fantastic days and have had landings in the Falkland Islands and in
South Georgia. Very soon we are doing our first landings in Antarctica. It is an
amazingly long distance from my home in Norway and I feel very privileged to be
here.

I am a trainee in the
expedition team and this is my first trip with Fram. I have an education in
nature conservation and have some experience in kayak guiding. So far the trip
has been very educational, with a lot of interesting lectures while having sea
days and many knowledgeable people to tell what we see on shore both
historical, geographical and wildlife. My main reason to come here was the
wildlife. I have seen many documentaries from Antarctica and the islands
nearby, and the scenery and wildlife are so beautiful. The fact is that it is
even more beautiful in real life. Our days in South Georgia were a little bit
foggy, but when leaving we could see these steep mountains dressed with snow.

My first meeting with
penguins was very special for me. At New Island in Falklands we visited a
colony of rockhopper penguins. It was so nice to sit and watch them just a few
meters away, how they were bounding and making nests without noticing all the
people watching. They were not disturbed by us at all, as long as we kept some
meters distance. One penguin approached me and almost walked on my shoe to get
its stone for the nest. And that applies to most wildlife down here, they are
not afraid of people and some birds and seals are so curious, like these king
penguins at Fortuna Bay.

What I was most amazed was
the size of the male elephant seals. I knew they were big, but in real life
they are huge! They can have a length up to 4,5 meters and weigh around 4000kg!
You do not want to argue with them! When kayaking in Grytviken (South Georgia)
we met them in the sea and one came up to look at the other guide Ralf just a meter away from him. I was a little bit
nervous, but he just watched for a while and swam away.

Before I came here, I had
heard a lot of what the intense whaling had done to the whale stocks and almost
made some species instinct. Introduced species from the whaling period are
still doing a lot of damage to the fragile wildlife. Rats in South Georgia made
some parts of the islands free from certain birds because they eat the eggs and
chicks. In Falkland you have gorse, planted by people living there earlier. It
is a beautiful bush with yellow flowers, which smell wonderful. So I can really
understand why they wanted to take them with them. Now gorse had spread to
large areas and by that excluding the native vegetation. So to avoid taking
seeds, bacterial, virus on shore everybody have to clean their equipment
properly. That warms the heart of a conservation biologist.

MV FRAM is the most modern expedition cruise vessel belonging to the Hurtigrutenfleet, roaming polar waters and taking people to remote places where only few go. In order to give you the chance to travel with us, even if only on your computer screen, we have created this blog. Here you can see what we have seen and read what we have done.

MV FRAM's voyage is followed by

About

The expedition team consists of lecturers and guides from various fields and backgrounds such as ornithology, mammalogy, history, and geology, ready to tackle all your questions. Together with the fabulous Fram officers and crew we make your time on board REALLY worthwhile!